Generally, communication links can provide limited bandwidth or communication rates. For certain types of communication link, including DSL connections for instance, distance and bandwidth are inversely proportional. As the length of a DSL loop line increases, the bandwidth of the loop decreases. DSL services thus tend to be limited in terms of reach, bandwidth, or both.
Communication link bonding, in which multiple communication links are configured as a group, addresses bandwidth or communication traffic rate constraints by allowing communication traffic to be transferred on more than one communication link. Each communication link in a bonding group provides a portion of an aggregate group communication traffic rate. Bonding thereby allows higher communication traffic rates to be maintained over longer distances relative to single-link implementations.
ITU Recommendation G.998.1 describes many aspects of bonding DSL lines based on Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM), and represents one example of a communication link bonding technique. However, this ITU Recommendation is silent regarding an architectural approach to bonding individual DSL lines, or any other types of communication link, into a group. This ITU Recommendation also fails to provide recommendations for optimizing an allocation of communication traffic rates to bonded communication links.
There remains a need for communication link bonding schemes with enhanced flexibility, to bond communication links provided by multiple communication chipsets in some communication equipment architectures, for example. A need also remains for improved techniques to allocate an aggregate group communication traffic rate among communication links in a bonding group. Communication link bonding techniques which are relatively easily implemented and have limited impact on processing resources and existing functions and applications may be particularly desirable.